It's Always Tool Time in Our Shop!

​text by Vicki     Sign up to get Mother Daughter Projects updates in your email!

It's no secret, I tend to collect and save what most people label as "junk!" It frustrates Steph but every once in a while that hoard comes in handy.

This "use what you have" clock project is an example of that. I have to tell on myself. We got a nice set of drill bits and drivers and Steph threw the old ones in the trash. I saw them and promptly fished them out, much to her dismay! She rolled her eyes and wanted to know what I was going to do with them. 

See those little bits up there in the picture, the seconds' markings on the clock? Those are the "fished out of the trash" bits! (After seeing the finished product, Steph apologized for rolling her eyes!)

The inspiration for this clock actually started with this center drawer I found curbside. I left the desk (it was big and bulky and I couldn't put it in my car) but took all the drawers. This is the first project with the salvaged drawers. To me, the back side looked like the perfect canvas on which to build a clock.

Materials:

• Clock mechanism (Amazon)
• Diablo SandNet Sandpaper (Home Depot)
• Makita Wet/Dry Vac (Home Depot)
• Rust-Oleum Carbon Grey Stain (Amazon)
• DAP Rapid Ruse (Amazon)

We started by removing the slide hardware from the drawer. See that screwdriver, it's so new it's not available yet at the Home Depot. Who knew a screwdriver could be improved! These Husky Dimond Tip Screwdrivers are the best!

To make it look less like a drawer, we used a jigsaw to remove the front edges so the front was now flush with the sides.

We gave the edges, front, and back a little sanding.

We found the center of the drawer and drilled a hole big enough to accommodate the clock mechanism.

This is a wood and cork kitchen hot pad. The cork was removed with a scraper and then sanded smooth. We are using Diablo SandNet sandpaper (our new favorite). In case you're wondering, the sander is connected via that hose to a Makita shop vac. On this particular model, when the sander is plugged into the vac, and dust collection automatically turns on. It has really cut down on the amount of sanding debris that gets into the air.

Once sanding was complete, this stain by Rust-Oleum was used. It's a new color and we really like it. A hole was cut into the center and we finished the round with a little poly.

The body of the box was painted with some Behr oops paint we got at The Home Depot. This paints sells for much less. We distressed the edges and used a little of the carbon grey stain to age the piece. Wipe on, wipe off--a little stain goes a long way.

I found a simple clock face on the internet, enlarged and printed it. I used it as a guide to chalk in the major lines of the clock.

Now the fun part! Everything was glued into place. I used an old macrame ring, spray painted silver placed outside of the wood round. Before I glued it into place, I chalked the placement outline to use as a guide.

We started hot glueing into place, but that didn't seem to be holding so we used Dap Rapid Fuse. I will say it was tedious to glue all those little bits into place!

Our purchased clock mechanism came with instructions. I point this out because some do not! The shaft for our clock ended up being too short, but we hacked it and got it to work. There may be a little duct tape involved!

This is the clock mechanism peeking out. Ideally there should more of it coming through the holes.

Back side of the clock which is really the inside of the drawer.

Sooooo, we were totally finished with the clock and it was hanging on the wall when Steph said "it needs a saw blade!"

We used this giant wrench from my Dad to hang up the clock. He earned his living first as a airplane mechanic and then as a car mechanic. Thanks, Dad. I'm putting your tools to good use!

See? We had it hung on the wall, when Steph decided we needed more. We took it down, disassembled it and added the saw blade.

Wow, see what you can do when you hoard, I mean collect stuff?

Learn how to use old driver bits, wrenches, saw blades, and more to make a shop clock perfect for a garage!

I absolutely love the way this turned out. It's the perfect shop clock.

I don't often gush about projects, but I love this one! Maybe because it was my idea start to finish with the exception of that last minute saw blade addition. It's an exciting challenge to take what you have to make something functional and fun!

What are you collecting that you can make into something else? Share what you hoard, or is that just me? ~Vicki

Please note: We are not sponsored by any of the companies/products that we used. These products were picked and bought by us.

FYI: We are not professionals, and we don’t claim to be. This is what we found worked for our project. Yours may need a little different approach. Safety first!

FYI: Affiliate links are being used on this page. Purchasing via these links help support MDP!

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